This idea about cheerful thinking, a digital platform for people to present their ideas, organise events around the country - that is what I am focused on building: a digital think-tank for the modern age that can help show people things can be better; the world can be different.

I remember, when I was young, to have a literary or artistic vocation was really dramatic because you were so isolated from the common world. You felt that you were marginal, and if you dared to try to organise your life around your vocation, you knew you'd be completely segregated.

Online one day, you log in, and you realise, 'This is not me.' Everything you're posting, you're doing it in the context of everything you've posted before. Let's delete everything, save the stuff that's important, and then you only have to organise the one per cent that's worth keeping.

Football will always be part of my life. I've taken an interest in it since I was a young boy; my father played, as did I, and I never miss the chance to organise a little match with my friends when my schedule permits it. I also follow the results of the major European leagues quite closely.

To build more interest in goalkeeping, we have to change how people think and report on goalkeepers. You are not just there to keep the ball out of the back of the net: you are there to impact the back four, to organise the team, essentially lead from the back. It is a really pivotal position.

Generally speaking, there's some quality of compulsion that attaches itself to the idea of the list. It's true that lists organise the daily chaos of working life. But the impulse to make lists has to do with something more than either administrative practicalities or the record of a creative process.

Class is something that I think seriously about and try to organise my politics around. I think there are lots of novels that don't really engage with questions of class at all, and they get less conversation about issues of social privilege than I do. But it's better to try and talk about it and maybe fail.

Share This Page